D&D 5E 5E psionics

[Kobold Avenger]

Well, no. The spellcasting classes in 5E are more different already than in any edition before. They look different and they play different. When you create a 10th level wizard, sorcerer, cleric and warlock, even a bard, you get totally different characters to play. They might share a spell or two, but that is all. Even sorcerer and wizard have never been that different before, which I like.

You don't need to copy any class system to create some nice psionic classes. And I don't want psionics to be just a variant magic class. Psionics are different, they are no form of magic.

Psionics has always been a form of magic, when magic(k) has been defined as "the science and art of causing change to occur in conformity to will" to quote Aleister Crowley. Then psionics is certainly a subset of that. Even thinking that Psionics != magic, leads to the special snowflake syndrome and justifies the perception that Psionics are imbalance and overpowered cheese (even if it's quite balanced). If Psionics ends up as something where it's immune to Dispel Magic, unaffected by spell resistance and anti-magic fields, then it is without a doubt a justification of those opinions. As many would say something like "why play a wizard anymore, and now I'm going to have to make a bunch of things that have the same type of resistance to that psioniky crap.. Alright, banned!"

D&D is no USA only game. It will be viewed and played different all over the world anyway.

I am not from the USA, and I know how many players and gaming groups from my country are. And they're the same as many gamers from the UK or Australia or even elsewhere in countries that don't speak English, and they all roughly share similiar opinions. The country someone is from is not going to change their perceptions on something like D&D.

If you can drop a psionic character into an ongoing campaign that didn't have such characters before and change very little about it, then the designers have done a good job on creating something that's actually usable. If it ends up being like 2e psionics, well then they would have failed in their job at integration.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I really want to see 2e psionics over 3rd.

I always liked the idea of building a set of powers for your character based on your specialty. I didn't like Contact and attack mod's being 1/3 contact and that all Psions have psi defenses.


I would love to see an over haul of that system where I choose a type of psion at level 1, and maybe have the option to expand out as I level, and some powers have min levels but most just have prereqs. I really want psi defenses to just be for telepaths.

I would like PsP to be a small number that regen fast... like start with Int mod, and add your level to it... but regen even without a short rest.

I would also love for soul knife psywarrior and others be sub classes to fighter and monk.


I really want the 3.0 and 3.5 races thought... Elan, Dromite, Half giant, Blue goblin, Kalishar

I also liked the psionic focus mechanic from 3.0... holding and expending... but I'm not sure if it could be made to work in a 2e type set up

 

[Joe Liker]

In a discussion about saving throws, Mearls said Intelligence saves would be used against psionics "when (not if) we add it."

There are tons of people who want it, so it would just be leaving money on the table if they decided not to do it.

 

[Goemoe]

Psionics has always been a form of magic, when magic(k) has been defined as "the science and art of causing change to occur in conformity to will" to quote Aleister Crowley. Then psionics is certainly a subset of that. Even thinking that Psionics != magic, leads to the special snowflake syndrome and justifies the perception that Psionics are imbalance and overpowered cheese (even if it's quite balanced). If Psionics ends up as something where it's immune to Dispel Magic, unaffected by spell resistance and anti-magic fields, then it is without a doubt a justification of those opinions. As many would say something like "why play a wizard anymore, and now I'm going to have to make a bunch of things that have the same type of resistance to that psioniky crap.. Alright, banned!"

No. I disagree. There will be people thinking like that, you prove that point, but as there is more than one roleplaying ruleset, there is more than one perception for psionics as well. From all the RPG rules my group has played, D&D is the only game with this weird view of psionics. Psionics are different and they will be that way everytime we play it. In 3.5E we used the 'psionics are different' option and it worked very well. You have to adjust the game rules to psionics != magic, but that is easyly done and just a matter of perception.

I am not from the USA, and I know how many players and gaming groups from my country are. And they're the same as many gamers from the UK or Australia or even elsewhere in countries that don't speak English, and they all roughly share similiar opinions.

As I told you, I disagree. Those people I play with or talk to about roleplaying are different, all of them. Why should we add or discuss psionics, if they are just another color of magic? But we don't even need to agree, play it as you like it.

Anyway, no matter how they will add it, for my group psionics will always be different. My only hopes are they will be announced or something(soon), so I don't have to reinvent them myself for 5E . We need psionic rules and we want to play 5E

 

[Kobold Avenger]

No. I disagree. There will be people thinking like that, you prove that point, but as there is more than one roleplaying ruleset, there is more than one perception for psionics as well. From all the RPG rules my group has played, D&D is the only game with this weird view of psionics.

Sure there's more than one perception of psionics, but if I were WotC I would want as many people as possible to use or at least accept Psionics as something to add. As more accepting psionics, equals more sales. So first of all they have to remove those common misconceptions about Psionics.

And D&D is not the only game that views Psionics as a subset of Magic. Many other games have something like "mind magic", and others have "psychic phenomena" as a possible theme for magic.

 

[jadrax]

If psionics uses a vastly different subsystem, it will insure that psionics will be rejected by even the more open-minded gaming groups. There aren't that many DMs who want to learn a completely new system just so they can accommodate one player who wants something different and therefore superior.

On the other hand, if its just using the same systems I already have, I am not sure I see the point of adding it. Psychics would have to have a definite unique selling point for me to even consider using them, I already have three arcane classes with umpteen subclasses, I don't need more.

 

[dream66_]

To me the biggest thing is the question of what do you want to get out of psionics

I see the argument of "If psionics is immune to dispell magic, why ever play a wizard."

Um, because wizards have fireball, and wish and time stop and big powerful magics.

I want to play a telepath in DND because of my enjoyment of telepaths in fiction, so I want to be like them

When I ask what do you want to get out of psionics in DND I'm thinking these guys,

http://www.sitcomsonline.com/photopost/data/3091/medium/Walter_Koenig_55665676.JPG

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/78/B5-lyta-alexander-300.jpg

And only MAYBE http://www.blendbureaux.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Carrie.jpg

I want my character to do what they can do, if they can't do it, I don't want my DND telepath doing it, I don't need a wizard copy named psion.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

To me the biggest thing is the question of what do you want to get out of psionics

I see the argument of "If psionics is immune to dispell magic, why ever play a wizard."

Um, because wizards have fireball, and wish and time stop and big powerful magics.

I want my character to do what they can do, if they can't do it, I don't want my DND telepath doing it, I don't need a wizard copy named psion.

I'm bringing up a typical example of the opposition to Psionics, one that will be validated if the Psion is too different from the established spellcaster patterns. The vast majority of those who don't want dispel magic to affect psionics typically are going for the Special Snowflake Syndrome. And while psionics has always been niche, I think the 3.5e implementation has been the most successful independent of any campaign settings.

Think drastically different systems will last? Just where is Incarnum these days...? I doubt it even sold well at all, and it was maybe only addressed once outside of Magic of Incarnum back in the 3.5e era. It sort of vanished in 4e, and I don't think anyone at WotC is putting much consideration into bringing that back.

It's also much easier to balance something like Ultrablast against Meteor Swarm if Ultrablast were a 9th level spell.

Someone already pointed out just how different the Sorcerer and the Wizard are, and they're both spellcasting classes. They use similiar mechanics, and they're thematically different from each other.

Now whether the psion uses spell slots just like the Sorcerer (power points are irrelevant since it'll be an option for all spellcasting classes), or some sort of variation of the spellcasting system like the Warlock. But the point is that psionics needs to be built into the standard system, and not be anything like 2e's mangled proficiency check system that was completely revised at least 3 times (Mental AC and Mental THAC0 anyone?), where everything doesn't match up at all with spells (a recipe for banishment of psionics from even more games), even if they're supposed to take up part of the Wizard's (or other similiar classes) niche.

 

[dream66_]

The moment you start taking about ultrablast shows me you missed the point of my post. Telepath shouldn't replace the party wizard, rather replace the social aspects off the bard

 

[Kobold Avenger]

The moment you start taking about ultrablast shows me you missed the point of my post. Telepath shouldn't replace the party wizard, rather replace the social aspects off the bard

They were never a replacement for the bard ever. Never at any point of the game. That's clearly the wrong idea of what a D&D psion is, and there's been at least since 2e the disciplines of Psychokinesis, Psychometabolism, Psychoportation, Telepathy and Clairsentience. Metacreation is a 3e creation, mainly because 2e's Metapsionics discipline never had a good standing.

This is about D&D psionics, not Babylon 5 psionics. Babylon 5 psionics just fuelling the other argument, "psionics is too sci-fi" about why many DMs and groups don't want psionics in their campaigns.

Another point is that back during the Mage Superclass controversy, WotC clearly saw the psion under that. And when they backpedalled and talked about unofficial class groupings like the Mage, Warrior, Trickster and Priest, they most certainly implied that the Psion is under the Mage grouping.